Uncertainty = Humanity

Life is a gamble. You mold fates and futures, not only of your own but also of those around you. Choice might be the only power which a person can wield, but oftentimes some of us may absent our destinies to a higher eventuality - which, in degrees, is made conscious by sheer belief or wisdom. Is there a "force" guiding such chain of events? Or do they happen to us because they've always been meant to be?

Personally, I don't hold much regard over "star-crossed" relationships or matters of inevitability. Nor does that fully equate to having a "whatever happens, happens" mentality. I guess it's a petty privilege to simply declare that one ought to take things as they come, that is, in a natural state of continuity without surprise. But we're human beings after all: notwithstanding our blasé attitudes, experiencing shock or denial is GOOD. It doesn't unconditionally imply that one allows emotions to malady one's judgement or that one is "mentally weak". Sometimes, it seems to me that nowadays expressing emotional opinions tends to be deemed "imprudent", especially in exclusive social settings. Of course, the overriding uncertainty of what other people will think of you emerges as the chief issue - I suffer from it as well. But, if not anything else, I have come to deeply realize one thing: as long as you don't sacrifice your own self-respecting value as an individual, the fleeting image of others' considerations matters very little. As creatures coexisting within innumerable social frameworks, the choice of living for ourselves a little is no less important.

My aunt visited the United States very recently. Her relative there had lost her husband six months ago. Seeing each other after a long time; there indeed was the usual air of happiness in reliving youthful memories, but what my aunt found so striking is that despite her relative's cheerfulness and complaisance, everything seemed still incomplete. Her relative, finally, meekly confessed to never having gone into her husband's study or their bedroom since the day he passed on. The two daughters he left behind share his clothes and wear them daily. They reflexively call forth his name at home; only to be reminded of the truth. My aunt told us: "It's already been six months, they can't go on half-pretending that he's still alive." She's right. But on the other hand, I can't forget the stagnation of grief those three women find themselves in at the present. I can't blame them for not being able to move on completely.

We all know: people grow and persevere. But, here, it's not a question of the fortitude required to bear with unimaginable pain as it is not a period in which one can expect to simply get out of and function with perfect logicality. The death of a loved one is never certain. Even against the certainty of death, we hope - that's why prayer exists, I feel. However, at the occurrence of the actual event, it's the immense gravity and uncertainty of it all that sweep over us. Why did this have to happen to me? we ask. Why can't I shake off this overhanging void?

The example I have used is only an aspect of uncertainty that we experience in life. Its nature is of so many kinds that the extent of our awareness eludes it. Since none can fully understand it, what we can try is perceive it and inwardly nurture ourselves to adapt to uncertainty. This might be a very deterministic way to look at things, but nothing in life goes exactly the way we want it to. Change is not the only constant: the course which our lives track bend within and beyond every realm of darkness and light possible, so what can be actually said is that Change is MOTION. Feeling regret or excruciating pain over the direction Change takes by saying things like "What am I going to do? I don't know what I should do." or "I don't know how to go on living anymore." doesn't help in the long-term. Uncertainty regarding the answers to those concerns will help in finding the answers we seek. Not being certain all the time as to what or how we should conduct ourselves over time gives us the freedom we need to explore our emotions, to stay with them and look back at them from a position of strength. Being stronger bears its fair share of past torment and scars.

I feel that we can't completely write off unfavorable events as having "happened for the best" or that "it couldn't have gone any other way" either. A few people I know follow that line of reasoning, and I can't agree with it because these remarks often decrease the value of that which has transpired. Everything that happens to us has meaning, for better or worse, and it is the meaning we choose to see that precisely bolsters us forward or holds us back.

For my aunt's relatives, the loss of a beloved husband and father is gradually enabling them to be stronger. For pain is helping them get back in touch with living. Yes, the space of the lost one shall always be unfulfilled; yet it is the strength that one discovers after long uncertainty - when one at last touches the light of what they've been looking for - that attributes value to all events that occur thereon. Emptiness is not as empty as we think it to be.

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